Need help with this simulator - changing landcape, and controling heli

[adam_jorgensen]

Thanks for the great sites johnhlong! They give pretty good steps. I'm really new to r/c helis, so its a matter of understanding the helpful information I hope I can do. Maybe I'll give you call sometime. You have been a great deal of help. I wish everybody would be as good of help like you.

One other question, how often, and how long each time should I pratice on the sim to at least prevent a fatle crash and know how to get out of a bad situation without any damage? Also to know most of the basics?

I am being a little too impatient I just really want to be able to fly good in the least amount of possible time. I always get all hung over when I want something to happen now and it takes a little work to get it done.

[johnhlong]

Think of it like walking out on a beam streatched out between two buildings on the 50th floor. You know you can do it if it were on the ground because if you slip you just put your foot on the ground and then back on the beam. But at 50 floors up you can't afford that one slip.

If you were goining to practice on the higher beem you would most likely venture out about a foot to see if you could do that and then return to safty. After a while you might venture out 3 foot. Then latter still out 5 or 6 foot.

It's like that in helicopters. Start with just raising the heli 1 foot off the ground and when it gets out of control (which it will) put it down on the ground. This teaches two things at once.

1, how to make small control movements at the right time to KEEP the heli under control verses big movements to try to recover.

2, You learn how to put her back on the ground without landing too hard which would cost you big time on the real heli.


After a while you will develope a sence of what to do when things go wrong. BUT you Need to develope that basic hover control as a base to try other things out.

When you start experimenting with fun stuff, your safty menuver is to somehow get the heli back to a hover, (even if its 100 feet in the air). From there you can fly her back to the ground. You DON't want to land her or get her near the ground until you have her under control.

Believe me, the ground is not your friend until you can aproach the ground without fear of crashing.

SO... practice hovering every chance you get. No matter what you do latter on you still will have to hover the heli so you can land her.


John

[johnhlong]

I would say when you can keep the heli in ahover for 10 - 15 min on the sim you are ready to TRY your first attempt with the real thing. If you only crash once in a while on the sim while trying the basic hover, you are NOT ready for the real heli (unless you like the building part better than the flying part of this hobby ).

You first flights will just be controled take off and landings of about 1 -2 seconds in duration. Then you will go to 15-20 sec of hover at 1 foot. Then to 1-2 min at 3 foot.

At any height above 1 foot, being able to land softly is critical....

You have a choice. Impress your friend with a speticular crash or get the fly the helicopter more than one time.


Happy hovering.

John

[adam_jorgensen]

How many days a week do you think I should pratice? I try to go for everyday if possible and a half hour each time. Is this good or should I be doing it more?

Also, when you say if you can keep it in a hover for 10-15 minutes, how exactely does the heli have to hover to be ready for the real thing? The thing is, I can hover it for at a certain level for mabey a couple of minutes, but it still moves around a little. When you say hover, does that mean its just hovering and not moving at all? A perfect steady hover?

Another problem, do you have to learn to hover at all angles? I can do it fine when the tail is facing me, but when its front end is facing me, then its all confusing, because the controls are now reversed. Its also confusing when your facing its side because its hard to tell what direction the rotor is tilted to compinsate. If the rotor is tilted away from you, you can barely notice it.

[johnhlong]

Re-read the instruction from those links I gave you.

By hovering I mean being able to control the heli and keep it close to you (10-20 feet) and in the air about 2-5 foot high.

Use the Training, helicopter scenery that has a field that looks like a small basketball court but with flags in the corners and a round heli pad in the middle.

It would be good if you could lift off, SLOWLY move the heli (in a hover) from flag to flag without crashing and the heli not getting outside the training area. Repeataly doing each flight with no landing and no crashing! Remember you have to land the heli after EACH hover, flight, hop, bounce, etc. Getting ot up in foward flight is easy. Getting it back down safetly is critical. You don't get any second chances on a bad landing :angry:.

Practice picking out where you want the heli to land and make sure you can get close to that when you land (without crashing).

Try this for fun, But only on the sim, jump the helli streight up, and then try to recover and land her. Also jab the stick to get her out of control and then make sure you can recover. That training would be a life saver. Just concentrate on getting her back to a hover 5-15 foot in the air and then causicouly land her. in real life this is when you colapse in a heap on the ground in a cold shacking sweat! Do this only on the sim


When you feel that you can do this in a safe enough mannor to chance it with the money you have invested in your real heli then you are ready for trying your real heli in small 5-10 sec hovers and small hops

It's all about knowing the next step on the sim in case things going wrong, but only doing the things you KNOW you can handle with the heli.

The danger is getting over confident with the real heli and if it crashes it cost big time.

Believe me, the first couple of flight will be very draining. If you keep in mind what investment you have at stake you should be ok.

You sound close to trying the real helicopter with small short flights.

Do NOT try any foward flight with the real heli for quite some time. When you do a foward 10-20 foot movement at anything above a craw it will scare you to death. It will do things you (and me) are not ready for. TRANSITIONAL FLIGHT

John
(425) 837-0802

[solo]

i practice by setting the tail trim in a way that the heli is spinning at about 1 whole circle every 4 or 5 seconds and then try controling it with the cyclic sticks.....this helps in changing ones orientation continously and in learning to put the proper stick correction quickly and before a virtual crash

[adam_jorgensen]

Sorry, for some reason i couldent get into the forum. But anyway, I was doing good. I was getting the hang of hovering, although I still need allot of work. This sim is not so bad. After all, its not its fault thats its jumpy, its my interface cord. I found out that my interface cord is just crap. Its the parrllel printer port interface. I have heard of many problems with noise that people have had with the printer port interface. I heard the serial pic, and the joystick ports are way better and pick up no interference and theres no noise or jitter in them. After the last time I said my controls were jittery, it stopped doing it. I did not like this fixing its self on its own, because we all know when something stops working and then starts working on its own for no reason, it will for sure stop working again. Sure enough, its started back up again only this time, it wont go away and no matter what I do to try to fix it, always no effect. I'm pretty sure its my cord where the problem lies. I want to get a joystick port. I heard they were the best, but know I got to spend like 50 bucks on another cord. I don't want to have to do that.

[johnhlong]

I believe ken's joystick kit is about $20.00 shipped from England.

John

[adam_jorgensen]

How can I contack ken to get the joystick interface?